The Trouble with Never
by ShutUpAndPull
Summary: A post-season one finale piece: Kate and Rick deal with the fallout of his actions after he comes to her with information about her mother's murder case - the one she told him to stay out of. Complicating things is a recovering Will who offers Kate a distraction, but is a distraction what she truly wants?
1. Chapter 1

**The Trouble with Never**

"It's about your mother," Rick told her, and then he fell silent and waited.

Those were the very last words Kate ever expected to hear in that moment, especially from him, given her explicit instructions just four days earlier that he stay the hell away from her mother's murder case, that he leave it in the past where it belonged, just as she had.

A wave of unmitigated anger rolled into her like a ferocious tide, the equal force of its push and pull the only thing that managed to keep her body upright in the middle of the near-empty corridor, and though she remained silent, a thousand vicious words raced instantly through her mind. She knew if she actually spoke them aloud, she'd likely later regret it, but she was absolutely certain he'd damn well earned each and every one.

"Beckett?" Rick pushed on through the piercing daggers of her cold stare. "Are you…did you hear what I said?"

The calm behind his words infuriated her. Her brain screamed in silence. Of course she heard what he said. It was the one thing she asked him never to talk to her about. And of course he'd ignored her. Richard Does-Whatever-the-Hell-He-Wants Castle disregarded her feelings, injected himself into a part of her life he had no business being in. Again. She should've known better than to have shared anything with him - about herself or about her mother. There he stood, making her hate herself for it, for opening up to him, like a fool.

"Did I _hear_ you?" The words finally sprang from Kate's mouth with an emphatic roar, and the two nurses engaged in conversation nearby snapped their heads in her direction with marked disapproval, a clear reaction to the surroundings-inappropriate volume of her voice.

"I need to tell you about what-"

"No. You don't need to tell me anything. You need to stop talking right now, Castle. Don't say another goddamn word."

Kate grabbed onto his forearm and pulled him towards the glowing Exit sign at the end of the corridor, away from the eyes and ears of those who'd already been forced to witness the ugly beginning of an inevitable end. The stairwell door's push bar vibrated from the intensity of her violent thrust, as its solid metal form slammed shut behind them with a resonating echo.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" She paced back and forth over the same small line in the floor, her body brimming with energy it couldn't find a way to contain. "Was I not clear enough when I told you to leave it alone, Castle?" she hissed, her hands balled up into fists at her sides, held tight to the edges of her sleeves.

Rick took a step towards her and she backed away like he was a flame. He still oozed that same calm, even in the face of her exasperation, and she could feel it like it was radiating from his body, reaching out, trying to draw her in. "This is too important, Kate."

It made her shudder, her breath catch. She'd never heard him say it before, her actual name – _Kate_ – and she loathed that the first time felt like a manipulation, like some patronizing mollification.

"You need to hear this. It could change everything." He kept coming despite her look of warning.

"You know what? You don't know me at all, Castle, and you damn sure don't have any idea what it is I need. If you did, we wouldn't be having this conversation." She looked away, off into the distance, and shook her head, wishing she was actually surprised by what he'd done. "It's already changed everything," she snapped crossly. "You need to listen to me this time, Castle. Really _hear_ me, okay? I don't want to see you again. I don't want to hear from you again. Nothing. Not at the precinct. Not about any books. Not about this. Not for _any_ reason." She looked him squarely in the eye. "Tell me, now, you understand." Kate waited as her words passed through their divide and struck him like a verbal slap across the face. "Say it. Say the words, Castle. Tell me you understand."

She could see them there, the laundry list of excuses and rationalizations all but inked across his lips, yet he offered none of them. Instead, after mere seconds of silence that felt more to her like a hundred years, he did as she asked - no, demanded - and choked out with a reluctant rasp the only response she wanted to hear.

"Yes, Kate, I understand."

Without another word, she turned and flung open the door, left him to watch through its narrow pane of glass as she walked away without looking back. "I'm sorry." His voice dissolved into the hush of the empty stairwell, unheard.

It hit her only then, as she walked back along the hospital's corridor alone, as it all played out again like some theatrical play in her mind - he'd said her name twice.

And now she'd never have the chance to hear him say it again.

 **xxxx**

Kate's knees buckled beneath her as she reached Will's hospital room, the well-worn chair outside his door her savior from certain collapse. She waved off the concerned nurse who stood in watch behind the desk across the hall and tried to assure her all was fine - a blatant but necessary fib. She didn't need this. Not right now. Not with everything that had just happened to Will. Everything that was entirely her fault, no matter who'd tried foolishly to convince her otherwise.

 _Forget about. He's gone. Just forget about it._ She repeated the words to herself silently, firmly, let them loop in an endless circle without beginning, middle or end - anything she could do to try to drown out the commotion Castle's left in their wake. She hated him for doing this now, when her friend was in a hospital bed, when her defenses were down, when she was just beginning to see him as…

 _Forget about it._

Lost in the chorus of her monotonous and ineffectual mantra, Kate failed to see the same concerned nurse approach, and it startled her to a jump when a hand came to rest upon her shoulder.

"Oh-I'm, I'm sorry," Kate apologized as her heart began its slow return to normal rhythm. "I didn't mean to…I just didn't see you coming."

"That's okay, dear," the older woman assured her delicately. "It's my fault. I didn't mean to startle you. It just looked like maybe you could use this," she said, a paper cup filled with water in her outstretched hand. "Of course, I'm a nurse and a worrier by nature, so I may have misread."

"No, this is perfect, thank you," Kate told her, swallowing down a first sip and turning her attention back to the woman. "You were right. It's just what I needed." She smiled and thanked the unexpected attendant for her kind gesture and, though wordlessly, the brief distraction.

"You can go back in if you like, dear," the nurse said with her eyes on Will's door. "He sure had a smile on his face when you were in there with him earlier. After what he's been through, he's a very lucky man to have you here for that." She winked and patted Kate on the shoulder in almost motherly fashion.

Kate nodded, but she didn't believe it for a second. Lucky? Right. If you only knew, she thought.

 **xxxx**

When Kate pushed open his door and stepped through, Will's eyes were closed and his face remarkably peaceful, not at all as one would expect in the wake of the ordeal he'd just been through. He was a beautiful man - always had been - even in his current state, not long out of surgery to remove the bullet that'd torn him open. And while that bullet hadn't come from her gun, the chain of events that'd led it to his body began solely with her, and that was like a twisting knife in her gut.

She slid the uncomfortable metal chair she'd left earlier up to the edge of his bed and sat with the utmost care not to wake him. He'd managed to doze off after she'd stepped out with Castle to talk, and she was glad for it. She was still struggling with exactly what to say to Will, how to make it better, if that were even possible. She could hear the words in her head, but they all sounded so frustratingly inadequate. Vulnerability wasn't something Kate welcomed or wore well.

Sitting there, watching Will sleep, the soft whir of his hospital machines behind her, she remembered vividly the moment she first saw him, how butterflies fluttered in her stomach like she was still some young schoolgirl, not a tough-as-nails cop who'd been brought in on his homicide case. He was so unshakably confident, so calm in the face of all the chaos swirling around him, he drew her in instantly. And without it, without his stoicism, that case might've buried her then. As it was, it still floated around in her mind more often than she invited it to.

She'd held Will's decision to move to Boston for the promotion against him, when, in point of fact, she could've gone with him as he'd asked. She lived the job, and on most days, it's what kept her in one piece. It would've been a transition, of course - a new city, a new force - but she could've done it if she'd really wanted to and, in the end, done it better than most. But it was less painful to say goodbye to him than it would've been to have left New York without answers to the most agonizing unsolved case in her life, though she'd sworn to herself she'd closed that chapter for good. The city kept her connected to her mother.

Kate watched Will's eyelids dance with the movement of a dream until the time came when, out of necessity, she felt compelled to close her own. She bent her upper body forward and rested her head against the edge of his thin mattress, the knuckles of one hand pressed lightly against the edge of his blanket-covered thigh. She thought of him as she drifted off, about how she'd reacted back then, about the end of what had started to become so familiar. She was there now with Will, and tomorrow would exist without Castle, and in that moment, she wasn't sure which of those two unexpected turns of event felt more confounding.

 **xxxx**

From somewhere inside the haze of her own dream, Kate felt a tickle in her hair and popped open her eyes. It took her a few breaths to come back to present, to remember where she was and with whom, and when she finally did, she found Will looking down at her from his pillow with a smile.

"Morning, sleepyhead," he said, as she dragged her knuckles across the weight of her eyelids.

"Wh…it's _morning_?" She couldn't believe she'd let herself sleep for that long, though the stiffness in her neck definitely suggested it could be true.

He attempted a chuckle in defiance of his aching body. "Easy, Kate, or you might end up in one of these beds. And I know how you feel about green Jell-O. It's only been a couple of hours, don't worry."

"Have you been awake this whole time? Watching me with that goofy drug-induced smile?" She leaned back in the metal chair and flexed her muscles in a delicious stretch. He really was a beautiful man. Neither the blur of sleep nor a bullet wound could ever change that.

"You want a hit?" He raised his wrist and presented his IV-burdened hand. "I think the nurse has a little crush on me, so she might go for it if I bat my eyelashes just right."

His suspicion didn't surprise Kate at all, teasing or not. "Thanks but I think I'll pass," she laughed. "I need to head over to the precinct to take care of a few things, and I'm pretty sure Captain Montgomery prefers his detectives a bit little less…out of it." She stood with a smile and pushed the chair back against the wall. "Will you be all right for a while?"

"You know, as I recall, you used to enjoy my smile," he said, his reaction time slowed by the medication drifting through his system.

"Still do," she said playfully. "I was just teasing."

"Kate," he began before a pause, "I'm gonna be fine, you know. You don't need to worry about me." He reached for her hand and she stepped toward him, the buzz of their past gently humming in the simple touch of their fingers. "This isn't your fault, Kate. I told you. Please don't think that. Okay?" He squeezed at her fingers with the little strength his own could muster.

"Okay." She reciprocated his gesture, though she didn't look him in the eye when the word finally came for fear he might see right through her. "I'll come by again in the morning. Get some real sleep, if your nurse girlfriend will let you."

"Funny girl," he said, as she rounded the bed and headed for the door. "Hey, Kate," he called out, her fingers already wrapped around the door's handle, "that smile wasn't drug-induced."

She knew what he meant. Something in his voice told her.

Kate pulled the door open and stepped from the room. She needed air.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

Kate spent any free time she could piece together over the following days beside Will's hospital bed, her motivation equal parts guilt, concern, and biting curiosity. The surgery for the bullet wound had been entirely successful, routine as she'd come to understand from his doctors, though she still wasn't able to reconcile that word - routine - with anything that had happened. Her friend - well, her old-friend-then-lover-now-who-knew-what - had been shot on _her_ case, thanks to her recklessness or lack of forethought or both. She had to face that reality. And yet, as much as her usual inclination was to sift through all the what ifs and should haves alone, there was some comfort in being around him again after all that time apart, and that was something she hadn't expected. The relief Kate felt in Will's progress and recovery overwhelmed her; each time he greeted her with a smile or cracked a stupid joke or flirted shamelessly with a nurse, there was such gratitude. Regardless of the burdensome weight of the guilt she'd placed on her own shoulders, he was still there, very much alive, by medicine or miracle, and in that was light.

But somewhere in the stew of her emotions also raged an utter exhaustion, not only because meaningful sleep had eluded her since the shooting - the sights and sounds of flying bullets aimed at her past unrelenting in their invasiveness - but also because her mind raced endlessly in the light of day, like a marathoner without a finish line, going and going, with no end in sight. She'd ordered Castle to go and he had. He'd actually listened to her, for once, done what she'd wanted. Now she just wished her brain would accept that and move on, leave her in peace.

 **xxxx**

On the morning of his discharge from the hospital, Kate sat in the dark blue, oversized chair in Will's living room as the sound of cascading water from his shower echoed between the apartment walls like the white noise of a lost radio station, banal yet romantic in its constancy. With a slow blink she scanned the room - not a large room, by any means, but comfortable by city standards - and took a brief inventory: a pile of worn paperbacks here, a discarded tie there, a mug and a plate from some breakfast past, abandoned for reasons unknown. His place wasn't remarkably lived in, the signature of its owner not on display for all to see, but it was inarguably Will Sorenson's home to anyone who truly knew him. And Kate did know him. Well, she did once.

The suede upholstery beneath her and the still air of the room a week empty smelled of him, and Kate remembered the scent all too well - confident, strong, thoroughly masculine. It used to permeate the thread of her clothing, of her towels and sheets, not overbearingly so, rather just enough to arouse want of more. And she always did want more. Wanting more is what made the end so difficult. More was something they should've defined back then, but they didn't, and then it was too late.

It was an odd sensation for her - odd among any number of other adjectives - to find herself in his space again, surrounded by his books and ties and discarded mugs. She never expected Will would be back in her life, let alone involved in two separate cases in her city within such a short span of time. Not that he was really back _in_ her life. Certainly in nowhere near the same way he was before Boston seduced him away. Yet there she sat in his blue suede chair, with his scent and her guilt and confusion and memories she had no idea what to do with. How strange it was that a man it seemed she might never be free of was gone and a man it seemed she might never see again was now showering in the next room.

 **xxxx**

"I thought I'd been in love before, but I was so wrong." Will's words took her by complete surprise. She didn't hear him sneak up behind her, but she could suddenly feel the warmth radiating off his skin.

"You-were wrong?" Once the words sputtered out, Kate couldn't help but wonder if they sounded as pathetic to him as they did to her. How foolish, she'd connected invisible dots to their history.

Will dragged his fingertips lightly along her shoulder as he stepped around the chair and perched along the edge of the coffee table. He was shirtless, covered only by the towel secured at his waist, his hair straightened hastily by way of hand. "A week in that hospital and finally a real shower," he said, his words dripping with satisfaction. "If I could've found a way to make out with it, I would've."

Kate silently chastised herself again for the unwarranted leap she'd made. A noticeably delayed and awkward giggle tumbled out of her, absent any immediate worthwhile response. He really was a beautiful man. Her eyes couldn't help but drink him in, battle scar and all - her battle, his scar. "Well, I try not to judge, so I hope the two of you will be very happy," she finally replied with a faint smile. "Now, besides being in love with your shower head, how do you feel?"

"Kate, you don't need to do that. You don't need to keep asking. I feel fine. I feel good." He leaned forward, elbows on his knees, the aroma of clean thrust towards her with the motion of his body. "Really, Kate, you need to stop beating yourself up about this. I know how you are, I know you feel responsible, like this was your fault, but it wasn't." He reached out and brushed her knee with his fingertips, let them linger there as he continued. "Look at me, Kate." He waited until her eyes found his. "It wasn't."

"Okay," Kate agreed softly, though she knew he wouldn't believe the acquiescence any more than she did. She didn't know what else to say. Her mind was everywhere and nowhere all at once. She'd been at his place for less than an hour and she already needed to run. "Listen, I, um-I need to head over to the precinct, actually. I have a mountain of paperwork to take care of and you know what happens when I leave Ryan and Espo alone for too long." Her work was her favorite hiding place.

"You're a cop, Kate, not a nurse. Go do what you have to do. I'll be fine. I've been meaning to paint the place and rearrange the furniture, anyway. It'll be easier with one less body around."

They shared a look and a laugh. "Don't you dare. Rest, please." She pushed up out of the chair and he stood to meet her. "I'll check in later this afternoon."

He took a step toward her and leaned in, placed a lingering kiss against her cheek. "Thank you. And, look, I know this all feels complicated right now, Kate, but everything will be fine."

She didn't know why, but she wanted to reach up and touch her cheek where his lips had just been. Talk about complicated. He didn't know the half of it. "I'll talk to you," she all but whispered as she pulled open the door to go. As she closed it behind her and leaned her weight against it from the other side, she silently counted the number of days gone by since she'd talked to Castle.

Seven.

It sure didn't feel like everything was going to be fine.

 **xxxx**

The chime of the precinct's elevator startled Kate's eyes open and she watched the doors slide open before her in what seemed like slow motion. Everything seemed to be moving slower for her, both as result of her lack of meaningful sleep over the past week and the quicksand through which it felt like she was trudging. She was stuck - stuck in the past with her mother, stuck in the present with Will, and stuck in the future without Castle - and there was no rope in sight.

Kate stepped out of the elevator and into a bull pen that felt hauntingly quiet, the exact opposite of what she needed. She needed the distraction of noise, the din of a case, the interference of the city's worst to free her of her burden, if only for a few hours. She crossed to her desk stacked high with files and dropped her messenger bag at her feet. As she rolled her chair out to sit, she turned to her team's Murder Board and released a sigh of gratitude. It was covered in colored ink, photographs, sketches, and timelines; all the elements Kate needed to create a mask of normalcy.

She shifted the stack of files off to the side of the desk and sat, and it was only then that she noticed it. Leaning there against her computer monitor was an envelope with her name on it - only her first name, and there was no address. Clearly it hadn't been mailed, but rather left there personally by someone for her to find. It wasn't until she flipped the envelope over that she found out who that someone was. On its flap were written the initials RC, and suddenly there were butterflies in her stomach. Just two letters succeeded in instantly washing away any sense of calm the sight of the Murder Board had gifted her a moment before. She held it in her hands but remained motionless, unable to move even one second forwards or backwards in time.

"He came by early this morning," Espo told her, his presence beside her desk yet another surprise. "Left that for you and took off."

"This morning?" Kate asked, as though the answer to that question held any relevance at all.

"Yeah, why?"

She looked down at the envelope in her hands again, at the RC written there. "I don't-"

She could almost feel the quicksand.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3**

"Earth to Richard, come in Richard." Martha's pursuit of her son's attention grew more persistent with her third effort as she stood, still robed, in the doorway of his office. Her blazing red hair was tightly secured in large curlers and draped in a scarf bathed in color - the likes of which would've made Crayola envious - and to say that she was a vision impossible to miss wouldn't have been an overstatement. "Oh, for heaven's sake," she mumbled under her morning coffee-laden breath, lobbing the quilted hot pad from beneath her mug in his direction.

The checkered disk landed on the desktop before him and propelled the loose papers there aside, his hand slapping wildly at them in his surprise. "What the…Mother? What're you doing?" Rick asked her as he eyed her up and down from across the room. "And what's happening with your head?"

Martha took a few steps into the office and perched herself on the arm of his leather chair. "Now, is that any tone to take with your mother?" she posed rhetorically. "If you must know, I have an audition in a little while and it requires a very particular guise, and Martha Rodgers is nothing if not committed."

"I see," he told her, swallowing a smile, "and why exactly are you in my office throwing things at me? Is that some sort of bizarre role prep, too?" Rick straightened the disturbed papers back into a neat pile and leaned back into his chair.

"No, no, kiddo, that's called _improv_. Absent a bullhorn, I did the only thing I could with what I had. I called your name three times and nothin'." Martha inched sideways and let her body drop into the soft of the chair, her eyes on the melancholy she found unhidden in his. She'd been witness to his dejection for days, ever since he'd been banished from the Twelfth and from Kate's side, and it was a state in which she was most unaccustomed to seeing him. "What's going on in that beautiful mind of yours, huh? Where are you today?"

Rick stretched his arms and clasped his fingers behind his head in a move too calculated in its nonchalance to fool her for even a second. "I'm fine, Mother. I'm not sure what you're-"

"Richard," she interjected, "do you honestly think I can't see that you're hurting? Besides being your mother - and a proud one at that - I do have two very capable eyes." Her voice faded to gentle. "You still haven't heard from her, have you? From Katherine?"

Rick dropped his chin and shook his head just once, both without a word.

"Have you tried to reach out to her since the hospital? Maybe she just needed some time to…her mother's case, Richard." Martha left it at that. The gravity in those words alone was enough, she knew.

"I, ah, I went by the precinct early this morning, actually, but she wasn't in yet. I guess Will was being discharged from the hospital today, so. Espo said she was probably with him."

Martha sensed how difficult that seemed to be for him to say. "So, you'll try again, of course, and then again, if need be. One thing I know you to be, Richard, is relentless in your pursuits - admirably so." She pushed herself from the chair and stepped up to the desk, reaching over to pluck her hot pad from his effects. "You get that from yours truly, of course," she said with a wink.

"I left a note," he said, and that was all.

"Good boy," she replied reverently and turned for the door. "Take it from an actress, darling, persistence pays," she said, her voice softly fading as she walked away.

 **xxxx**

Kate drew her hand to her desk drawer for the fifth or seventh or tenth time that day, never, until that moment, able to actually pull it open to reveal what waited inside. She'd dropped the envelope out of sight that morning through hastened breath, as the sensation of dry cotton overwhelmed her throat, and though it had since remained unseen, the urge to tear it open had picked at her over the many hours like a bird with a worm.

Kate tried all day to convince herself it wasn't fear. She was stronger than that. She was stronger than anything and anyone. But as her fingertips now clutched the envelope's edge, her heart raced with the pounding of a hundred nightmares. She could hear the echo of its beat in her ears, the bull pen around her finally absent the bustle of the day, and she attempted to calm herself with one very deep breath.

"Love note, huh? He spray it with cologne?" came a voice from behind her. "Knowing Castle, it's probably filled with that obnoxious confetti crap that explodes everywhere when you open the envelope. That shit's impossible to clean up." Espo stepped up beside her with a chuckle. Kate quickly pushed the envelope into the side pocket of her blazer and turned to him, knowing full well he'd witnessed her overt move. "Everything okay?"

"Fine. Why?" she answered too quickly to sound anything but purposefully deflective.

Espo was her partner, her friend, and he knew her well enough to leave it right there, exactly where she wanted it. "Carlton'll be in at 8 AM with his ambulance-chaser," he told her, dropping a file folder over her shoulder onto her desk. "You want in?"

"Like I'd miss that circus," Kate assured him with as much of a smile as she could muster. She wished silently as he walked away that she could just close her eyes and fast-forward the clock to the next morning, to 8 AM, to Carlton and his greasy lawyer in the box, to the distraction of work she so often leaned on. Her hand slipped furtively to her pocket and she drew her finger along the coarse edge of the envelope's thick paper.

"Bright and early," Espo called back to her. "I'll bring the coffee and doughnuts."

"Thanks, Javi," Kate replied, for the offer and more.

 **xxxx**

Kate flipped open the note again as she sat in her car around the corner from Will's apartment building. Darkness enveloped her, save for the faint glow of a streetlight a few paces up the sidewalk, but that didn't matter. She'd already memorized the words Rick had written on the page, the lines and swoops of his letters, the triangle indentation left by the turned up edge as it was stuffed into the envelope. For a prolific writer, his sentences were few, but their impact was absolute. Kate recognized the words as though they'd been penned by her own hand, from thoughts she'd had herself since their abrupt end:

 _Kate,_

 _I'm sorry I didn't listen. I'm sorry I ruined it. I'm sorry I hurt you. Thank you for awakening my inspiration. I'll miss your voice._

 _Rick_

She wondered if she could go back, if she could silence the anger he'd stirred in her. Even as she sat there, staring at his apology, it bubbled to the surface. Anger is what helped keep her whole, though, helped keep her from shattering into a million pieces, helped keep her heart shielded from further casualty. She'd clung to it ever since her mother was ripped so violently from her life. It helped drive her as a cop, as a seeker of justice. And yet, in short time, Rick had somehow managed to peek beyond the wall she'd constructed, and that both rattled and excited her. She didn't know how. She fought so hard against it - still. But he was the one.

The screech of a nearby car alarm shook Kate from the stalled moment she'd fallen into and she reached for the bag of food on the passenger seat. The four flights of stairs up to Will's apartment afforded her time to summon the semblance of a smile, and he returned it tenfold when he opened his door and found her on the other side. He looked settled, rested, already, and Kate marveled silently at his resilience. He was always better than she was at moving on. "You look good," she told him and she meant it, as he ushered her inside for the second time that day.

"I do look pretty good, don't I?" Will quipped and drew a laugh from her. "Oh, and you think that's funny, Ms. Beckett? Hey, you said it, not me."

"I…no, you just reminded me of someone. That's all." Her words sounded more apologetic than they needed to given his playful tone.

"Someone, huh?" He stepped closer and held out a hand. "What's in the bag? Is it what I hope it is?"

 _Someone_ , she thought but didn't say, Rick's letter burning a hole in her jacket pocket. "I, uh, I stopped and picked up some Chinese. I thought you could probably use some edible food after a week eating cardboard at the hospital." The room smelled the same as it had that morning – like Will, like she'd remembered so vividly even after all the time they'd spent apart. Kate's eyes wandered while he rifled giddily through the bag of tiny cartons and aluminum tins. The plate and mug from the morning were gone and the solitary tie nowhere to be seen. The stack of paperbacks remained, though, one of them cracked open and flipped upside down, evidence of how he'd spent part of his day. "I miss reading a good book," spilled out of her in little more than a whisper.

"What?" Will followed her eyeline to the books. "Seriously? You used to read three books a week. I used to have to resort to extreme measures to pry your attention away, as I recall." His words were heavy with suggestion and fond memory. She knew precisely the measures he spoke of and just how successful his extremes once were.

"Yeah, I remember," Kate said with a hint of blush. "It isn't as easy to find the time these days, I guess. Work is-"

"Even with your extra helper?" There was a hint of disdain in his tone.

Kate bit at the inside of her cheek and turned to him. "So, you ready to eat? It's probably getting cold." Her attempt at a change of subject was both jarring and unsuccessful. She reached for the bag of food and Will's hand came down gently on her forearm.

"Are things not…This is me, Kate. I know you, remember? I can tell when something's wrong." He set the bag down on top of the blue suede chair where her day began. "Are things not okay with your writer?"

Kate looked away. Somewhere. Anywhere. He wasn't _her_ anything anymore.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4**

It'd been over a month since Will's shooting, and almost as long since she'd opened Rick's letter of apology. It still sat on her nightstand, tucked into its envelope, dropped there on the night she'd first read it, but it was coated now in a light sprinkle of dust that glistened when the light hit it just right. Kate still remembered its words as though it were delivered to her just yesterday. They played across her mind now and again in rare moments of stillness; but despite any acknowledged measure of want on her part to open the door to him again, the actual key that fit that lock remained elusive. And though she hated to admit it to herself because of what it affirmed about her current emotional state, Will and all the time she'd spent with him of late had provided her a satisfying distraction, one that she was most thankful for.

She truly did care for Will, regardless of how their relationship came to an end and in spite of their time apart, absent any contact. He was a good man and they were good together when they were good together, but their timing was off. And Kate knew their timing was still off – because of the shooting, because of work, because of her head and her heart and Rick. Rick was always in the room with her now, like some invisible force that refused to be driven away despite her most vigorous efforts. She spent so many of her minutes and hours now wondering how the hell that was, how the hell that happened.

Kate rolled over onto her side and pulled the rumpled sheet up under her bare arm. She could hear the gentle clank of ceramic and metal from the other room - the unmistakable sounds of morning coffee - but in that moment a part of her wished the sounds would just disappear. She understood their reality. She knew what they meant. She never intended it to go that far, to find its way to her bed, to get so far out of her control. But it had, and as her weary eyes landed on the envelope just out of her reach, she had to fight not to scream at the world. At herself.

Will made several attempts from the bedroom doorway to win Kate's attention but each failed in its effort. It wasn't until he came to stand before her beside the bed that she even knew he'd returned. The curve of her body unwittingly offered him a pocket to sink into and he took hasty advantage, one hand around the grip of a mug and the other atop the arc of her loosely covered hip. "Hey, beautiful," he said with a tickle of his fingertip at the sheet. "Where are you this morning?" She could hear it so clearly. It wasn't concern in his voice as much as it was hope that she might be lost in the same utopia he'd evidently awoken in.

Kate blinked hard out of her fog and angled to face him with as much welcome surprise as she could will herself to portray. "For me?" she asked in deflection about the coffee when her smile began to feel more contrived to her than candid.

"For you," he affirmed as he reached to set it on the table next to the bed. He leaned in and kissed her lips softly before resetting into place against her. "That's one crazy machine you have in there, so I'm sorry if it's not what you're used to. Hopefully I get points for trying, at least."

Will's air of pure comfort and calm vexed her, not because she begrudged him such contentment, but because her insides were swirling like a savage storm had hit and his stillness inspired such an overwhelming envy. "Yeah, we, uh, we got a new one at work and-" She stopped mid-sentence as though the remainder of her words had simply vanished. Even the mention of a damn coffee machine made her think of Rick. "I'm sure it's fine, thanks," she finally managed, reaching for the mug and sipping the steaming liquid cautiously. Her body lurched forward as she swallowed and she quickly set the mug back down. "Oh, that's-"

"Very hot, Kate," Will chimed in with a snicker.

She looked up at him as she slid her tongue back and forth along the roof of her mouth. "Not so much hot as unbefitting the name: coffee. So, somehow you can take down dangerous perps with one hand tied behind your back but you can't woo a simple coffee machine into submission, is that it?"

Will grabbed her arm playfully and rolled her so he could kneel and straddle her waist. Nearly his entire body was on display before her and hers couldn't help but react. His scar from the shooting drew her eye, and she swallowed a pang of guilt as a chaser to the awful sample of coffee. "Simple? That machine has more buttons than the freakin' space shuttle," he protested, his hands pinning her wrists against the mattress above her head.

Kate resisted against his hold but chided herself silently for the less than convincing effort. "Come on, spaceman," she teased, forcing him back with a rush of energy born of a sudden need of space, "we're going out so you can buy me a proper cup of coffee."

"Bet they don't have these kinds of problems up there," he huffed jokingly before freeing her from his grip.

Kate flashed a smile, but there was little behind it. How had it gone that far?

 **xxxx**

Alexis poked at her plateful of chocolate chip pancakes with her fork as Rick looked on from across the table. She'd barely touched them since their favorite waitress had set them down in front of her nearly fifteen minutes before, and that was anything but the norm. It was his daughter's favorite weekend breakfast spot and she always ordered and devoured the very same fluffy stack of pancakes with a satiated smile. That Saturday morning, though, according to what Martha had told Rick earlier, was a very different kind of Saturday morning.

"This is the longest I've ever seen food on your plate at this place," he said jokingly. "I think the staff is starting to get nervous." He waited a moment or two before he pushed. "Hey, maybe I can help if you tell me what's wrong."

Alexis set her fork down and looked up, a single tear dropping from her cheek onto the edge of her plate below. "It's stupid," she told him as she wiped her eye dry. "I don't even know why-"

"Sweetie," Rick interrupted, "it's not stupid if it's upsetting you. And even if it is, there are plenty of people who'll tell you stupid is one of my specialties." She smiled gently and he did likewise. "Come on, take a bite of the gooey deliciousness and let's hear it." They'd always been close, certainly more so than other fathers and daughters he knew, and that was an immense source of pride for him. He'd been playing the role of both parents for a long time, and though Alexis assured him she wasn't terribly affected by the absence of her mother, he knew it couldn't be easy to be a girl of her age without such an important figure around on days like that.

Alexis finally swallowed down a forkful of her pancakes and Rick could instantly see a change in her face. How enviable it was, he thought as he watched her, that the problems of the young could be so easily soothed by the simplest of distractions. "I asked Nolan to the Spring Formal yesterday but he told me Amelia had already asked him." She jabbed her fork forcefully into another stack and chewed it deliberately until it was gone.

"Ah," Rick hummed knowingly, not revealing how much he already knew. "I assume this is the Nolan you've been talking so much about lately? The one with the hair and the freckles and the smile?" He knew this time would come eventually, but deep inside he wasn't entirely ready for it. "Okay, so there have to be other dances or events you could ask him to, right? You guys have stuff going on at that school all the time."

"And then I found out from Missy that Amelia hadn't asked him yet, but he was hoping she would so he lied," Alexis continued through shaky voice. "I told you it was stupid. _I_ was stupid. I should've known."

Rick reached across the table and touched her arm. "Hey, that's my kid you're talking about, and she's the furthest thing from stupid." He tapped softly at her wrist for her attention. "Look at me, Alexis." Her eyes were wet again and he slid an extra napkin her way. "I know I may be biased, here, but you're a beautiful, intelligent, funny, sweet girl and there are going to be plenty of other Nolans in your future." Alexis squinted her eyes in silent disapproval. "Okay, well, no, not Nolans because he's clearly a jerk," he sputtered. "I meant kind, honest, chivalrous boys who will be worthy of all that you are."

Alexis giggled and dabbed her eyes with the napkin. "How many times have you been in love, Dad?" she asked after a moment, but his focus had shifted elsewhere and it appeared he hadn't heard a word. "Dad?" she tried a second time but, again, he offered no reaction. She twisted on her cushion to try and get a glimpse at what had transfixed him, and there, just inside the front door, she spotted Kate with a man she didn't recognize, but who, given that his hands were perched along her hips, clearly knew Kate very well. Alexis turned back to Rick who had since broken his eye lock on the pair. "Who's that with Detective Beckett?"

Rick glanced their direction once again as they were shown to a table nearby. In that moment he knew for certain, as he swallowed down the knot of nerves that'd crept up into his throat, he'd been in love at least once.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5**

Kate didn't notice Rick seated just a few tables over from theirs until she pulled back one of the chairs to sit. Despite the popular weekend breakfast hour, there were still a few empty booths free along the room's perimeter, yet somehow she and Will had ended up at a table in the middle of the room, one that afforded her an uncomfortably direct view of the person she somehow wanted both most and least to see. She simply couldn't fathom the odds or the luck – good or bad – that Rick would be eating in the very restaurant she'd chosen that morning, and suddenly the notion of some greater something at work in her life didn't seem as fantastical to her as it had a moment before.

Kate's pulse quickened and her mouth went dry almost in an instant, and as much as she wanted to she couldn't make herself look away. It was there, too, just as she'd left it weeks before; Rick still carried the somber air born of her dismissal in the hospital's stairwell and it kicked her in the gut all over again. As she sat there, she couldn't help but wonder what he was thinking, though she wasn't even sure he'd seen her yet, his eyes cast solemnly downward at something or another. The uncertainty didn't lessen the effect of his presence on her, though, as she ordered herself silently to blink. Thousands of restaurants, she thought as she finally managed to divert her gaze and take a breath, and then all at once the weight of the previous night with Will began to feel like a mountain upon her shoulders.

"One _large_ industrial strength coffee, coming up," Will said with a grin as he flipped the menu to peruse the restaurant's breakfast offerings. "And if you're lucky, I might toss in some pancakes." He looked up at Kate and smiled a wink. "I remember how much you used to love weekend pancake breakfasts in bed."

"Will," Kate exhaled, but nothing else came. Her eyes felt an urge to wander the room but she fought it back and managed to refocus. "I'm not really in the mood for pancakes," she told him with an unintended bite. "But, I, uh, I'll let you buy me an omelet instead," she followed with an artificial grin. She heard the sound of her own voice and felt like a swindler in some late-night infomercial, peddling a product that wasn't at all as advertised. She knew their previous night together was a mistake, knew she'd never let it happen again, and yet there she was, letting him buy her morning-after eggs while she sat there smiling phonily and thinking about someone else.

"Have I told you how gorgeous you look in the morning?" Will said into the silence between them. Kate tucked a piece of hair back behind her ear and bit anxiously at the corner of her lip. "Look, Kate, I don't know what-"

"I can't do this," Kate broke in before he could finish his thought. "I shouldn't have done this," she went on. "Will, it's not…" Her words trailed off as she noticed Alexis slide out of her seat and stand to put on her coat. She turned to Kate and raised her hand to wave and Kate subtly returned the gesture, more instinctively than consciously.

Will swung his head around curiously just as Rick was climbing from the booth. Each of them spotted the other and nodded in acknowledgement. "I heard he liked them young," he joked spinning back around to Kate.

"Jesus, that's his _daughter,_ Will," Kate hissed, seemingly catching none of his intended tone.

"It was a joke, Kate," he said with a chuckle. "Man, you really do need some coffee." As he scanned the room for a nearby waitress, Kate watched as Rick followed Alexis towards the front door without even a glance in her direction. On that morning, in that restaurant - she simply couldn't fathom the odds.

 **xxxx**

The grass was still damp from the previous day's relentless rain and Kate's black leather boots were flecked with loose blades of green grass. She didn't visit as often as she should or as often as she'd like, but the chained ring that hung around her neck, close to her heart, meant her mother was always with her, and Kate drew tremendous comfort from that. Not a day went by without a memory, rarely a night without a dream, and as she walked the short, unmarked path from the cemetery road to her mother's headstone, the sound of Rick's words echoed in her mind like thunder through a canyon: _It's about your mother._

Kate owed so much of who she was to her mother; even the hell of surviving her death made her a stronger person. But the line between cop and daughter had become so blurred in her early years with the force, and the only way she found to remain as close to whole as she could possibly pretend to be was to build up walls around her. She had to stop running into the darkness after shadows and try to find some light, and for many years that light had been the justice brought about through her work, the closure she provided to so many who, like her, had been tragically left behind. Only now, during these weeks away from him, did Kate truly realize how much light Rick carried with him and how desperately she missed that light around her.

Kate pulled her arms from her jacket, spread it out along the grass, and sat with her mother in the soft grey of the afternoon. She'd sent Will home after breakfast, and with a hug promised she'd call later. She would call, she would, but the things she had to prepare herself to say wouldn't be easy and she felt so selfish. She'd taken what she'd needed from him, but at what expense? Will was someone she cared deeply about and this was how she'd treated him. She felt so terribly selfish.

She leaned forward and brushed a pink flower petal from the stone and looked up at the dates carved below her mother's name. It was always one of the most difficult things about her visits; all the experiences and years her mother would never live, that she was robbed of so savagely, made Kate's heart physically ache. Her eyes began to fill with tears, but she blinked them away. If she allowed them to fall, she knew how difficult it would be to make them stop. Her mother had always been her touchstone, her North Star to point her in the right direction, and as lost and confused as Kate felt, she needed guidance now more than ever.

Kate opened her eyes suddenly to the sound of a distant voice, having not even realized she'd drifted to sleep at some point. She remembered lying on her back a moment before with one hand on her mother's stone and the clouded sky above, her thoughts like paths in a maze, circling and crisscrossing in a frustrating jumble without a clear end, but she looked down now at her father's watch around her wrist and nearly two hours had passed. She looked over her shoulder as the same voice called out again but she saw no one. As she stood slowly, her muscles stiff from the unforgiving ground, and bent to retrieve her jacket, she noticed something coming towards her: a dog running free with its leash dragging on the ground behind it.

"Well, hey there," Kate said, greeting the Golden Retriever as though it might answer back. The voice she'd been hearing was closer now, and she could only assume it was that of the dog's owner calling out for its return. "Sounds like someone's looking for you," she told the tagless canine who now sat perched at her side. "Over here!" Kate hollered into the otherwise peaceful cemetery around them. She raised her hand and waved when the woman finally came into view, and she grabbed the dog's leash to head for the road.

"Gosh," said the breathless woman who'd clearly been jogging at the very least, "thank you so much for catching him. I've been chasing him all over this place."

Kate handed the woman the end of the leash and reached down to rub the dog between the ears. "Well, to be fair, there wasn't much catching involved. He just came running over and sat right down. Didn't you?" she asked the dog, who looked up at her as if to agree. "He's a beautiful boy."

"Oh, don't let the good looks fool you. Ricky, here, is a rascal if there ever was one," the woman chuckled. "I adopted him a couple of months ago and, well, let's just say he's still learning how to take direction. He's as loyal as they come, but listening isn't his strong suit."

Kate had to remind herself to breathe when she heard it. "His-his name is Ricky?" Twice in one day she'd been left in disbelief.

"Yeah, well, I know it's not very creative, but I lost someone close to me recently and I really wanted to keep his memory alive in my life, so…"

Kate looked back over her shoulder towards her mother. "I can understand the feeling," she replied reverently. "I'm Kate, by the way."

"Gosh, I'm so sorry. This one has me all flustered today," the woman said, giving Ricky's head a rub. "I'm Lexi – well, Alexis, actually. It's nice to meet you, Kate."

Kate wished she had something beneath her to catch her near fall. "You too, Alexis." Her day had become a relentless barrage of coincidence that she couldn't even begin to explain.

"Well, thanks again, Kate. We need to get going now, but Ricky, here, hopes that if you ever need help, someone just as kind and willing as you are is there to offer it. Come on, buddy, let's go."

Kate watched the two wander off together down the road before she returned for a few final moments with her mother. "Did you do this?" she asked only somewhat in jest. "I remember you being much more subtle than this, Mom." A gentle breeze kissed her cheek as she pressed her lips against the top of the stone in farewell, and in it floated her mother's words: _Always fight, Katie. If you want something, know it's possible and make it happen. The trouble with never is that it's too easy a word to say and too easy a notion to believe in, but easy isn't always right and easy isn't always best._

She'd never heard those words so clearly.

 **xxxx**

Kate knocked twice at the door and took a step back. Her heart was in her mouth as she waited for the door to open, having shown up unannounced, uninvited, and, more than that, quite possibly unwelcome, the last of which would crush her though she'd certainly understand. When no one answered, she did her best to clear the lump from her throat and she knocked again, believing she'd heard sounds coming from the loft when she'd arrived – ever the cop.

She caught her lips mouthing silent words of hope just as the door swung upon before her, and she halted them with a quick bite at the soft of her inner cheek. She couldn't decide whether or not she was relieved to see Martha or more on edge than she'd been seconds ago when she didn't know who might answer. But it wasn't Rick, and now she'd have to hope all over again that he was somewhere inside.

"Katherine, hello, dear," Martha said with audible surprise. "How lovely it is to see you again."

"Thank you, Martha, you too," Kate replied, wondering how lovely it could actually be given how she'd left things with her son.

"Come in, come in, darling. I was just putting on some water for tea."

Kate stepped inside, her hand gripped in Martha's, and she felt herself flinch ever so slightly when the door clicked shut behind her. What happened next could be one of the best or one of the worst evenings of her life, and she wasn't sure how prepared she was for either. She'd ended up at his door because of a stranger and a dog and a breakfast joint, and none of those things, either separately or in their entirety, made much sense at all. But there was her mother, and for whatever reason, on that day, she couldn't help but believe her mother had a hand in all of it. That was a new feeling and one she felt thoroughly compelled to listen to.

"Would you care for a cup of tea, Katherine?" Martha asked, fluttering off towards the kitchen.

Kate hadn't moved from where she stood just inside the loft door. "Um, no, Martha, I-" she began before she heard his voice from across the room.

"Mother, was someone at the-" Rick stopped moving just outside his office the instant he saw her. "Door," he said, completing the question he now already knew the answer to. His brain could barely form thoughts or words and it was written all over his face. Kate took a step further inside and watched breathlessly as he tried to process the surprise of seeing her there. "Kate," he uttered after a long moment and in a tone she'd longed so desperately to hear.

"Well, I'll just leave the two of you alone to talk," Martha chimed in cheerfully, abandoning the tea kettle for the staircase. "I hope I'll be seeing you again very soon, Katherine."

"You too, Martha," Kate answered, her eyes still focused on Rick who'd already begun his slow approach. "Hi," she said like a nervous schoolgirl to a crush once he made his way to her. How simple a word, yet how difficult she found it was for her to say.

"Is everything okay?" Rick asked, as though nothing at all had happened between them, as though all that mattered was that very minute. "Do you want to come and sit?"

Kate nodded gently and followed him to the couch, each propped against a pillow in its corners and with what felt like a world between them. "Castle," she said, her hands in fists in her lap, "I've been thinking a lot about the way we left things – the way I left things – between us and I just…"

"Are you with him again? With Will?" Rick interjected because he absolutely couldn't hold it in another second. "You were there this morning. I saw you and it seemed like-"

She still had to call Will. She still had to think about what to say to Will. "I'm not with him," Kate said with sincere conviction, though, as things stood now, she knew Will would surely believe quite differently. "And I saw you, too, Castle," she continued for whatever it was worth.

Rick dropped his eyelids shut for several seconds in silent relief. "Kate, I want you to know – I _need_ you to know – how very sorry I am for what I did and for that day in the hospital. I had no right to interfere and I never, ever, meant or wanted to hurt you. I would never."

"I still have your note." Kate drew a finger nervously over a dark spot in the denim of her jeans. "I wanted to…I don't let people in easily, Castle." One thought didn't connect to the other, but the words just came out. "I'm the one who's sorry, Rick. These past few weeks have been really hard," she said, swallowing down the lump in her throat, "and not having you around every day…" She had to just shake her head because she didn't have enough composure for the rest.

"Well, as the song says, I'm a hard habit to break," Rick teased in rescue, as he so often did – as she so often needed. Kate looked up at him with a smile, the first truly genuine smile she could remember in such a long time. "Such a hard habit to break," he sang to her amused chuckle. He had no idea just how fitting the song actually was. Someday she hoped he would. Someday.

"Castle," she said, her smile giving way to the gravity of her thought, "will you help me?" She'd never asked before. In all the years since, it'd been her fight alone. But he was there now, the one she'd waited for without even realizing she'd been waiting.

"With anything, always," he responded without hesitation, without any of that day, without any of the weeks lost.

"It's about my mother," she said.


End file.
